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Month: July 2018

Automobile Insight: Overdiagnosis

Automobile Insight: Overdiagnosis

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I shared how my car not starting led me to a revelation of spiritual truth in my last blog post, but I guess I still have a lot to learn. My car still won’t start.

We have seemingly gone through everything. Tested the battery: it is fine. Tested the starter: it is fine. Located and removed every fuse and relay in the car and all are functioning properly. Ran electricity straight to the starter and it cranks up the engine, which seems to be just fine. So why won’t the car start when I turn the key in the ignition?

I am a creative person, but ultimately I have the mind of an engineer. I am a fixer. Just visualize the person in your life that is the most likely to try to fix everything–all the time, overanalyzing everything along the way–and multiply that by like 100 and that is me. I can’t stand when things are broken or just inefficient. And the “whats” in fixing isn’t ever enough for me, I must also understand all the “whys.” As in, I don’t just want my car to start, I want to know why it isn’t starting now.

I may have become slightly delirious given all that has happened this week, most predominantly the poison ivy rash that has developed into splotchy red and insanely itchy patches all over my body and one location of gnarly looking blisters at what I’m assuming is the unfortunate location where I came into direct contact with the poison ivy oil before spreading it around my skin. My only desire at this point is to go to sleep and wake up when it’s all over. In normal circumstances, I would go full-throttle in uncovering the mysteries of my car and disregard everything else until I found my “why.” However, these aren’t normal circumstances, my body is weak and tired with all my resources being diverted to healing my annoying rash. Just put a pin in it. I’ll worry about the car when I have enough energy to drive it.

At least that is what I would have done. This time. Because of the circumstances. But, now that I’m married, everything isn’t just about me.

In my crippled state, my husband decided to carry the fixer torch for me. I would come home from work, fall asleep on the couch as he spent hours tinkering with the car desperately seeking the solution to get my car started again. In retrospect, I should have been grateful and showered him with praise for staying up late night after night chasing every lead when I didn’t have the strength. But, I didn’t do that. No, instead I just got upset and even snapped at him a few times for not waiting for me, “I thought we were going to work on the car together. I thought you said we were a team,” and for buying parts, “Why would you spend all that money on parts if you don’t know if we actually need them or not?!”

The frustration continued to build as I watched my husband get so fixated on fixing the car, he didn’t seem to be thinking straight. I really became concerned about my car as I had flashbacks to that one time my brother took apart a lawnmower and couldn’t remember how to put it back together. You can’t just take everything apart haphazardly. Won’t help my car start if it’s in a pile of pieces. No disassemble! Anyone else remember Henry’s Awful Mistake? The extermination of a single ant in the kitchen is not worth the destruction of your entire house.

I started to worry that my husband was so far into the weeds, he’d lost sight of what was important–that we get the car to run. Even if it cost money and requires us to take it to an auto mechanic. Even if the mechanic gives us a running car and can’t explain why it wasn’t running before or how he fixed it. Having a running car is what is important. So, I marched out to the garage late one night and encouraged him to come inside and get some sleep because as much as I appreciate what he’s trying to do, he’s really just running a risk of causing more damage when he’s too tired to function properly.

My mind started to turn through the whys of my darling husband’s actions. He is adamant about getting at least 8 hours of sleep every night. He falls asleep on the couch if we’re watching TV past 9 PM. He’s usually the calm one, no worries, no problems. And here he is staying up until 1 AM with tunnel vision on finding the problem with my car. Why couldn’t he just take a break to regroup? Let it go. Chill out a bit.

I am going to blame the poison ivy for my delay in processing the information, but the irony finally hit me that this must me how my husband feels about me. All the time.

It is possible to overdiagnose a problem. The medical community actually has a growing problem with overdiagnosis as thousands undergo “preventative” treatments they may not even have and others are being diagnosed with diseases that have no treatment and thus leave the patient with a lower quality of life drown in fear and anxiety over something they can’t change or control.

I personally find it important to understand the whats and whys; but I’m starting to learn how important it is to keep yourself from being consumed by asking questions and seeking solutions. Not everything that is broken needs to be fixed.

My husband got caught up trying to fix my car. Meanwhile, I’ve been caught up for years trying to fix his life. Magnifying and rehashing everything from his past. Trying to find a solution to repair the relationship between him and his ex, so our children can witness their parents having a healthy working relationship, like I know something he doesn’t about a relationship he was in for 20 years. I might be trying a little too hard. Just maybe.

I’m astounded once again by how much this man loves me.

Love is the answer. In case you were still wondering. The second lesson from my car that won’t start is a demonstration of unconditional love. Love is the why behind my husband’s seemingly bizarre behavior, and the driving force behind the persistence to pursue at all cost. My husband loves me and knows how much my car means to me, and just wants me to be happy. I’m glad he is also mature enough to already know this and appreciate the overdiagnostic fixing I try to implement out of my love for him.

Love truly is the greatest gift. Don’t squander it.

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body [a]to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.

And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 NKJV

Automobile Insight: Unmet Expectations

Automobile Insight: Unmet Expectations

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Monday morning I was going through my normal routine, I got in my car to go to work and turned the key…

I’m a person of high expectations, and my expectations for my car is that it runs–every time I turn that key. I spent the time and money laying the groundwork to meet that expectation. I bought a brand new car, a reliable brand and model. I am adamant about taking care of it. I have done everything I can to maintain the expectation I have. It is the most expensive thing I’ve ever purchased (and by myself). I’ve had it for over 10 years. I’ve kept up with the maintenance, and have never had an unexpected repairs. I’ve done everything imaginable to keep that car in a condition where I can always count on it to start and take me where I need to go. Every time.

Monday apparently missed that memo. I turned the key and… nothing. Nothing happened. Well, all the dash lights lit up like a Christmas tree, but there was no sound–not even an inkling that the engine was even trying to start.

I am just going to be honest here, I don’t handle unmet expectations well. I am a detail-oriented and very strategic person who plans and prepares so things will go as expected. No surprises. That is what I like. That is what I expect. So, the car not starting thing didn’t go over well. Especially on a day my husband had gone out of town with a friend to go kayaking and I was breaking out in a poison ivy rash I just hadn’t noticed yet… needless to say, by the end of the day I felt I was living out a storybook. Mel and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

The car situation pales in comparison to the other unmet expectations in my life. But serves as a perfect metaphor. Your car won’t start and everyone around you has an answer or judgement. You become frustrated and defensive– “No, I didn’t leave a light on and drain the battery. No, I didn’t forget to fill the gas tank. Seriously, stop looking at me like that. I did everything right. This should not have happened.”

Our expectations say it shouldn’t happen. But it did.

Same thing happened with my career. I went to school and worked my butt off. I was an honor student who studied non-stop, graduated in the top 20 students of my high school class, was offered multiple college scholarships, went to college and continued my dedication to education over socialization, duel majored in growing and competitive industries (Communication and Technology), graduated with honors and a passion to use everything I learned to make an impact in the next place I landed. Well, where I expected to land: a career in the field I spent my whole life preparing for. But when I turned the key, that car didn’t start either. It’s been over a decade since I graduated and I still don’t have a job in “my field.”

My expectations were that if I followed the plan and worked hard I would get the job I wanted. I followed the plan. It just didn’t work the way I thought it would. So far none of the redirections along the way have fixed it either. It just is. I have to live everyday knowing my life just isn’t what I expected and no plan is impervious to unforeseen circumstances. Most of our expectations are unwritten and unspoken. I never really thought about my expectation of my car starting every time I turned the key, but it came barreling to the forefront of my mind the moment it wasn’t met.

My car not starting is sad, wasting my potential in a job where I feel underutilized is depressing, but not being able to diagnose and fix the brokeness in my family is life shattering.

When I married my husband I knew things wouldn’t be easy forever bonding myself to a family shattered by divorce. However, I still had expectations that things would be better than they are. I guess I thought I was immune to surprises, having come from a broken home myself. That I had the answer key, and a map to all the landmines so we could cross the desert without igniting any fatal explosions. But, sometimes I turn that key and the car doesn’t start.

For the three years we have been married, I have daily walked past the bedroom we set up for our stepchildren–a room that they have never used. It breaks my heart to see it empty, I can only imagine how much more it hurts my husband. I long for something I have never had, but he longs for something he lost–the children he created and raised. He recalls fabulous memories of camping and fishing with his kids and remembers a better time; while I have only dreams of my imagination of what I wish for things to be like. We both have our own unspoken expectations. If we allow those expectations to go unchecked and sideswipe us when they go unmet, it can destroy us, our marriage, and our family.

Take a lesson from me and my car: be cognizant of your expectations of things and people. Don’t allow yourself to drift into despair when things don’t go as you expect. We have terrible seats for analyzing our entire lives, our perspective is incredibly distorted being right in the middle of it. I don’t know why my car wouldn’t start Monday, or why we still can’t figure out what is wrong with it, but someone else does. Maybe I just needed to learn this lesson. Maybe I needed more patience. Maybe if my car had started Monday morning, I would have died in a fiery car crash on my way to work. Afterall, while my job seems like a huge mistake that took me down the wrong/unexpected path–if I hadn’t struggled after college I wouldn’t have moved, if I hadn’t moved I wouldn’t have gotten the job I have now, if I hadn’t gotten the job I have now I wouldn’t have met and married my husband, and if I hadn’t married my husband I wouldn’t have started this blog. So who’s to say things aren’t meeting expectations? Just not mine.

So, if you put your key in the ignition and your expectations aren’t met the moment you turn it to the “start” position, try not to be upset. Re-evaluate your expectations. And praise God for knowing what you need every moment of every day. He is not worried about my car never starting again, or my job never bringing me fulfillment, or my family being broken forever, no, God has a much better perspective of the big picture. He is aware of all the work my husband and I have put into building a foundational marriage to break the cycle of divorce for our children, and all the preparations we have made in our home and our hearts for the day our children come home. Maybe I’ve seen the film Field of Dreams one too many times, but I truly believe our work will pay off and my family will be reunited. God sees all of your hard work, too. He is using our struggles to teach us, because our God isn’t a God of meeting expectations, He really prefers to exceed them.

“My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”  James 1:2-8 NKJV